darkSpyro

Has anyone tried out Punk Shock on the 3DS version? I'd love to get a bit of feedback - she plays quite a bit differently than on the console. Definitely curious of what people think.

Thanks in advance.

Well from my experience, I think she is alright in the 3ds version. While I can't say she's better in 3ds than console, she still is strong and really does benefit from having her unique upgrades in the 3ds game.

//forum.darkspyro.net/spyro/vi...64&post=5015300

If they play differently like Punk Shock, it's good IMO, if their moveset is pretty much the same as the console one it feels unexciting and the character will usually be inferior(see: Wind-Up, Grim Creeper, Pop Thorn), it also gives the 3DS version something unique that the console version doesn't, and makes buying a character- as well as both games- more worthwhile in that having different movesets for them on the 3DS and console gives more value.

Oh, wow, that made my day. Thank you. It's always a challenge to make a character fun with fewer abilities and less buttons, but we try to provide an experience that best fits the 3ds. Punk Shock's initially looked like she was going to end up very similar to Zap. That's what led to Punk Shock's puddles forming electric currents.

Her second upgrade initially gave additional bolts that fired off from the main one, but it didn't feel impactful enough. The piercing and increased rate of fire were random things I tried out and just felt good, and had the added benefit of being less memory-intensive.

Anyway, thank you again for that write-up. Glad someone enjoyed it.

Ahh! It feels so awesome to have a developer respond to something I posted! I feel honoured!

Thanks for taking the time to read what I wrote! It's nice to hear about her development(even if it's just a little tidbit), because I just love hearing about game development in general, especially from the person who (I assume?) designed her 3DS moveset! I'm glad that you enjoyed what I wrote.

Yep, that was me - I designed and scripted her behavior. She was my final character, and I spent close to a month on her.

I'm glad your summary caught a lot of small mechanic details people tend to miss, because it's those details that I take the most pride in. For example, each of her electric puddles have its own electric charge, and shooting them increases that charge up to a maximum value. As its charge grows, the damage dealt by a puddle grows as well. This also scales the particle effect on the puddle, and that effect grows and shrinks to match the current charge.

Meanwhile, the lines between the puddles do the exact same thing, except they use the average charge value between the two puddles. So if one puddle is charged at 10% and another is at 100%, you'll deal the base damage + 55% of the maximum bonus damage. The lines also shrink and grow over time, and when they fade away, the alpha blends out as well so that it doesn't look appear too jarring.

Implementing special abilities is usually pretty straightforward (though Punk Shock was somewhat unprecedented), but it's those small details that take a lot of time. They usually go unnoticed, but they add up to create a more polished feel to a game.

Well, BigNand, if you are the person who designed her, for the 3DS, congratulations from Me too!
First time I saw her I tought "Oh, great, an antropomorphic Zap...", but I was wrong.
She uses electricity like him, that's true, but she is a full ranged character, with water granades, instead of slime trails, and a pretty cool and powerful close up attack.
Her 3DS version sure adds a nice original touch to her, adding the lines between charged puddles, and the possibility to make them explode, when sprinting; but it still keeps her console playstyle, and that wasn't an easy thing to do.
Great work, man! Hope you'll work on Skylanders 4 3DS version too.

Punk Shock plays pretty well (better than most of the new guys). I like her Electric Slide upgrade. Also I have a few questions related to Skylanders 4 to ask you (If you know anything). If your not allowed to answer that's understandable.

1. Who is working on the 3DS version of Skylanders 4? I heard TfB is in charge of both the console and 3DS versions. Is this true?

2. When will we see a reveal of the game? Soon? E3?

3. Will we see major changes to the 3DS version (graphics for example)?

That's awesome! What other characters did you design? If I had to guess, Zoo Lou and Scorp also seem to have the same kind of solid gameplay. Did you create them? And if you didn't, please tell whoever did that (in my opinion, anyway) they translated really well! I didn't like Scorp much on the console, but he's actually one of my favourites on the 3DS, while I think Zoo Lou is just as good as on the console. Those two along with Punk Shock stood out as my favourites on the 3DS. I haven't played everyone on the 3DS, though.

Heh, I love to pay attention to small game mechanics(though usually after beating the game once, so I can enjoy it normally first). It helps me appreciate games more, plus it gives me something to mess around with to see how everything works, and try to figure stuff out. (On the downside, sometimes I get a bit too focused on stuff that doesn't matter.) I didn't actually catch how you could charge up the water puddles, I'll probably boot up the game again just to check it out.

Just realised something, too- if she's electrified, she can fire faster- which would make it easier to charge up puddles, right? So in a subtle way you could use those two abilities together pretty well. Was that intentional, or happy coincidence?

Also, while like Giants, I found the levels design kinda bland, I LOVED, LOVED, LOVED the Land of The Dead. Very creative idea. For Giants I liked the Tunnel of Love level. SSA still remains my favorite Skylander 3DS game. You still did a GREAT job! Riptide, Scorp Freeze Blade, Dune Bug and Boom Jet are my favorite new Skylanders in the 3DS version.

Arc, it was intentional.

As for other characters I did, you've got a good eye. I actually did Scorp as well, and I spent a lot of time getting his projectiles to arc naturally and feel fun as well as getting the ones on the ground to work properly. The projectiles are actually based on special code I wrote for Boom Jet's rockets, and they are the only two characters that use that system. Scorp's final upgrade was my own call, as well. I don't think we had any characters with a sudden boost like that, so there was concern that it wouldn't feel right or be overpowered or send the player flying off the cliffs a lot. But it turned out really well and, to me, makes him feel much more exciting. Scorp is actually my favorite character, because he proves that polished simplicity is often more fun than tons of complicated abilities. Scorp and Punk Shock were the last two characters I did, so I like to think I improved a bit throughout the project.

Other guys I worked on were Night Shift (I just did a second pass and polished some of his abilities), Boom Jet (getting his jet working properly when it flies away was my most difficult task on the project), Spy Rise (it bugs me that we forget to hook in his assassination animation), and Slobber Tooth (he was extremely difficult to implement with our engine limitations, but he seems to work. I'm also very proud of refactoring his tail spin attack into one where he bats the enemy with his tail).

HeyitsHotDog, I'm glad to hear you like Scorp and Boom Jet as well. There are sooooo many little things that went into Boom Jet. Even the way the volume for his propellers slides up and down based on movement speed, and then the rocket SFX scales up when you sprint... just more of the small details I am proud of. One of my favorite things to do in the entire game is to load Boom Jet, turn on 3D mode and just fire rockets at the screen. As for levels, I like Undead Fiesta, as well, but my favorite level is Sheep Wreck island. With 3D mode on, some of the background visuals are pretty freaking cool.

Quote: BigNand

Arc, it was intentional.

As for other characters I did, you've got a good eye. I actually did Scorp as well, and I spent a lot of time getting his projectiles to arc naturally and feel fun as well as getting the ones on the ground to work properly. The projectiles are actually based on special code I wrote for Boom Jet's rockets, and they are the only two characters that use that system. Scorp's final upgrade was my own call, as well. I don't think we had any characters with a sudden boost like that, so there was concern that it wouldn't feel right or be overpowered or send the player flying off the cliffs a lot. But it turned out really well and, to me, makes him feel much more exciting. Scorp is actually my favorite character, because he proves that polished simplicity is often more fun than tons of complicated abilities. Scorp and Punk Shock were the last two characters I did, so I like to think I improved a bit throughout the project.

Other guys I worked on were Night Shift (I just did a second pass and polished some of his abilities), Boom Jet (getting his jet working properly when it flies away was my most difficult task on the project), Spy Rise (it bugs me that we forget to hook in his assassination animation), and Slobber Tooth (he was extremely difficult to implement with our engine limitations, but he seems to work. I'm also very proud of refactoring his tail spin attack into one where he bats the enemy with his tail).

HeyitsHotDog, I'm glad to hear you like Scorp and Boom Jet as well. There are sooooo many little things that went into Boom Jet. Even the way the volume for his propellers slides up and down based on movement speed, and then the rocket SFX scales up when you sprint... just more of the small details I am proud of. One of my favorite things to do in the entire game is to load Boom Jet, turn on 3D mode and just fire rockets at the screen. As for levels, I like Undead Fiesta, as well, but my favorite level is Sheep Wreck island. With 3D mode on, some of the background visuals are pretty freaking cool.

I noticed Slobbertooth moved a bit awkward in-game. It's awesome to know that someone who worked on the 3DS games visits here sometimes.

I'll reply to the rest of your post later, but actually, Sheep Wreck Island was one of my favourite levels as well. I think my favourite level has to be Shimmering Shard Shire though, or one of the other Crystal Caverns levels. I think the levels in the Chinese-themed world [can't remember the same right now] and aformentioned Land of The Dead also had really good visuals although for some reason I don't think they were as fun to play. Maybe it's just because they were longer, and I prefer being able to run through shorter levels. I also love how SWI level got a unique remix of the console title theme(and it's a good remix in itself, it sounds more adventurous than the regular version and it fits SWI perfectly too, I'm actually disappointed that it wasn't used on the console version of SWI).

@HeyitsHotDog: I was the designer for the Undead levels, Shimmer Shard Shire, and Tunnel of Love on Giants 3DS. Thank you for digging those levels.

@BigNand: I'm trying to see if I can guess who this is by trying to remember who did second pass on Night Shift. This is either DLux or Tom. You mentioned Sheep Wreck so I'm guessing this is Tom. HI TOM!!

If this is Tom then everyone can thank him for coming up with the name 'Shimmer Shard Shire'. We were coming up with names for our levels and I was upset of how they cut my Space level and I had to turn it into the Crystal level. I wanted the name to be a tongue twister but couldn't think of anything on the spot. Tom smiled and said the name which I thought was great.

If anyone is interested, I'm starting to write a few posts on my website for my design choices and/or a look into why things were done the way they were in my levels. I've written about 2 of my levels so far but I will have more written in the next week or so. Check it out if you'd like at http://www.jonweber.com

If you have any questions you can fill out the Contact Form in the right column on my page. Thanks again!

Nope, not Tom. Patrick.

Great to see actual developers on the site.

How was it for the n-space employees to suddenly have 50+ characters sheets dumped at you and somebody say what main character? these are all the main character. They all attack different, have different animations, I want them done yesterday.

Just to say hi to the Devs that are reading

It's always nice to get a chance to say a personal thanks for the work put in. I've liked all three of the 3DS versions and it's fun to play on the way to work, sometimes I even let the kids play too

Was interesting to hear just how long it takes to get one character working just right, as somebody who has done game development on their own I appreciate how hard things like this are.

I like the 3D effect and how the characters and levels look, so much so that I still play SSA on my PC in 3D mode (special monitor and 3D drivers).

Thanks for your hard work guys.

@BigNand: Doh! That was my third choice but I thought you had moved on to another game by the time the second pass of Night Shift came around.

Quote: JonWeber

@HeyitsHotDog: I was the designer for the Undead levels, Shimmer Shard Shire, and Tunnel of Love on Giants 3DS. Thank you for digging those levels.

@BigNand: I'm trying to see if I can guess who this is by trying to remember who did second pass on Night Shift. This is either DLux or Tom. You mentioned Sheep Wreck so I'm guessing this is Tom. HI TOM!!

If this is Tom then everyone can thank him for coming up with the name 'Shimmer Shard Shire'. We were coming up with names for our levels and I was upset of how they cut my Space level and I had to turn it into the Crystal level. I wanted the name to be a tongue twister but couldn't think of anything on the spot. Tom smiled and said the name which I thought was great.

If anyone is interested, I'm starting to write a few posts on my website for my design choices and/or a look into why things were done the way they were in my levels. I've written about 2 of my levels so far but I will have more written in the next week or so. Check it out if you'd like at http://www.jonweber.com

If you have any questions you can fill out the Contact Form in the right column on my page. Thanks again!

SPACE LEVEL? C'mon, that would have been awesome! Any concept art?

@HeyitsHotDog: Shimmer Shard Shire was originally a playable Space level but after we were told that we couldn't do a space level (You can read my thoughts on that on my webpage) we changed it to what you see now. I didn't have any concept art for it, just notes that I wrote down on what I wanted to do. Man oh man do I wish people could have played through those levels. You can see some traces of the original level if you look at Shimmer Shard Shire. The Earth Elemental area has a moon/asteroid in it.

Quote: JonWeber

@HeyitsHotDog: Shimmer Shard Shire was originally a playable Space level but after we were told that we couldn't do a space level (You can read my thoughts on that on my webpage) we changed it to what you see now. I didn't have any concept art for it, just notes that I wrote down on what I wanted to do. Man oh man do I wish people could have played through those levels. You can see some traces of the original level if you look at Shimmer Shard Shire. The Earth Elemental area has a moon/asteroid in it.

I read it. Sounded VERY creative. If there is not space in Skylands, then how do you explain the UFO hat or the Space Helmet? Same with Star Strike!

Quote: HeyitsHotDog

If there is not space in Skylands, then how do you explain the UFO hat or the Space Helmet? Same with Star Strike!

Yup. Trust me. We mentioned all aspects of what was already in the previous games. :-)

Was it N-Space that told you no Space levels or TfB? If it was N-Space, then I'n not surprised that they're not making the 4th Skylanders 3DS. game.

No it was not n-Space that said it. n-Space was all for it.

Activision is the publisher and they have say in anything that goes into the game.

Activision! DAMN YOU! TfB would be all for it as well!

@BigNand Aww, all those other characters, I haven't played in ages. I've played with Boom Jet, Night Shift, Slobber Tooth and Spy Rise on the 3DS as well but it's been ages since then. They didn't really stand out to me as much as Scorp did, I didn't really play much with them. I really liked playing those guys on the console when I got them, and never ended up trying them out much on the 3DS. Actually, I remember I didn't try vanilla Boom Jet or Night Shift at all, I just used them to combine with other halves to access Rocket and Teleport Zones. Slobber Tooth did look a bit weird, but he's still solid. I actually noticed Jet's engine noises when I was playing with some Jet combo(I don't remember which one). I was messing around to see how the jet's fire animated when it moved and I noticed how the engine volume changed.

@JonWeber Good call on the Moneybones fight, that was much better than just having it be fighting against waves in one spot. I don't like how that's been used a lot now in these games, honestly.
I noticed the golden ducks in the bottom of the vault, although I never made the connection to Scrooge. Nice touch. It actually took me a few goes to notice the Frightbeard statue, JCat mentioned it here, but I didn't know what they were talking about, and when I noticed it I was like "ooh, that statue... Wait why no Hektore statue?!". Now I know.
Also, Moneybones' "You'll break in two!" always seemed like an odd phrase to use to me, over some kind of "this is the end, Skylander!" line, but now that I know where the line comes from I think it's pretty funny.

I've heard in passing how publishers can put pressure onto developers but I didn't know that they could actually get something pushed into a game like that(and it's something I'll keep in mind when I'm critiquing things now). Do you know if they also asked you guys to make the camera pan onto stuff on other levels as well? It's especially frustrating when you go back to replay a level. It always annoyed me here because 3DS Giants and SF were obviously trying to add more exploration than 3DSSA, but the camera pans directly contradict that. *facepalm* It's really sad that you had to add those in. The first time I went to replay the level, I skipped getting the key and headed up first. It really annoyed me when the game decided to point me in the right direction, when I knew where to go. It's also why I don't replay the second Crystal Caverns level as much as I'd like to- that's another one of my favourite levels, but I hate having to see those cutscenes every time I play it, and there were quite a few on that level, which ruins it for me. I hardly ever play it, as much as I enjoy the level design. Those cutscenes are exactly the same thing as the unskippable cutscenes in the middle of levels on the console.

I've actually been wanting to see space in the series for a while. Some time back a bunch of people were speculating about what the 4th game could be, and someone bought up the idea of putting the Skylanders into space. I've been trying to think about what you could do for a space level, and since we're talking about that now, I realised I never really came up with anything and ended up coming up with the idea of a level that took place on a sun, where phoenixes roosted(as I've wanted to see the phoenixes in Skylanders too). Also, with a Water Element Gate in there (possibly with the area having some kind of steamy theme) just for irony.
Anyway, the clouds and blue sky have to end somewhere and lead to the rest of the universe which is dark with no lighting but the suns, right? And Skylanders is supposed to take place in the universe we live in, isn't it? The final version of Shimmer Shard Shire personally appeals to me more than Retro Rocket, maybe because that's the one I've played already, but some of your ideas for the level sounded really neat(especially the satellite). Don't know if I think "year 3000 tech" would really fit Skylanders lore-wise, though(at least the way I'm imagining it in my head, not claiming to know what you guys were gonna plan for it). I mean, look at tech that's already in Skylanders like that which the Trolls and Arkeyans had- if even better tech was available it seems odd that neither of them would have it, and it seems odd that this kind of tech, so different from other stuff in Skylands, would be in one set of levels randomly and used nowhere else without some backstory about it. Although, I guess for irony you could make tech that looks like it's from the future actually be worse than the tech that's ancient, which could be why it was never seen before- nobody used it because it was just bad tech. Heck, that'd actually be able to work fairly well, if a space level took place near the edge of Skylands and nobody ever visited there then it'd make sense that there was just outdated tech lying there. I think an outer space theme would have worked fine anyway, though, especially considering Aurora Peak from 3DSSA is already an existing level with a starry backdrop and falling stars... And honestly, as long as it's explained I don't see what the issue with adding "year 3000 tech" would be either, it's too bad that the idea was rejected.

Thank you guys for taking the time to post back to everyone and share so much info. I'm definitely keeping an eye on your blog, Jon.

Space level? What would be different? Black sky with stars and gravity maniulator a la Angry Birds?

I can see the teleporter trick done via Sheep Wreck do something more sophisticated to send you to other islands, or have a Sci Fi inspired theme level (a ka Kaos' Fortress)...they kinda are doing it now in sparse terms anyway imo...it could get more sophisticated but again we are locked into their "target market" so I wouldn't expect much.